As I noted last week, I’ll be moderating a “Role of Java in Innovation” panel during the community keynote. It’s on Thursday at 9am in the Continental Ballroom (same room the exhibit hall has been all week).

Here are some questions I’m considering asking – I would love to hear any suggestions on questions or themes you’d like to see covered.

– Brief intro of each panelist and describe how Java fits into your ecosystem (Cloud, Big Data, Communities, Social, Hardware Tinkering).
– What does innovation even mean to you? (Audience is diverse, just trying to establish that innovation means invention, or improving on inventions. Also, to establish that invention of technology may be focus in many minds, but invention of business model, channels and markets equally important).

Some general questions
– What is the VC perspective on platform choice in start ups? Do VC’s care?
– Bill Joy of Sun once famously said “innovation happens elsewhere” – why is it that communities do such a great job at innovation?
– Is there anything other communities are doing better that the Java community should emulate?
– Hardware tinkering seems to be all about heterogeneity (many boards, many architectures) – does this actually help with innovation, or hinder innovation? Aren’t we just reinventing the wheel over and over?

Questions around the Three Themes:Diversity
– Social diversity (geo, skill level, etc) — how does it help you innovate, what are the challenges?
– Tech diversity — does the technology breadth of Java help, or hinder, innovation in your community?

Rapid Prototyping
– Is complexity (in the platform / language) becoming a hindrance to pace of innovation? Are we (going to)/(are) facing the innovators dilemma?

Sharing and Remixing
– Java culture seems to embrace sharing and remixing more than others, why? Can we cultivate it any further?